Chapter 509: Divine-Level Massage

Taking advantage of the free time while Biteful and Goldeen each rested.

Adam posed another question.

"What do you think are the key points of using offense as defense?"

"Grasping the timing, controlling the moves…" Baimu replied softly, pausing before asking, "And sufficient experience?"

The middle-aged gentleman showed an approving smile. "Exactly. To control your opponent's moves at will, you must understand as many types of moves as possible, as well as the differences in how different Pokémon execute the same move."

He suddenly tossed out another Poké Ball.

Pop!

Light flickered.

A Whiscash, blue all over with a pale-yellow belly, thick lips, and a w-shaped pattern on its brow, splashed into the pool.

"Use Tickle on the water's surface."

"Namu!"

Whiscash manipulated the long whiskers by its mouth, which were emitting white light, to stir the water's surface.

Adam said, "See that? Milotic's Tickle is used through its tail fin, while Whiscash's Tickle relies on its whiskers."

Whiskers… what looks like whiskers at all! They're clearly tentacles!

Baimu silently watched Whiscash casually wave its "whiskers" about, recalling that in the anime this thing had once tied up a Swellow, while micro-controlling the very tip to use Tickle.

"To master using offense as defense, understanding this kind of knowledge is extremely important."

Adam said softly, pulling a USB drive from his pocket. "Inside is multi-angle footage of different Pokémon using different moves that I had someone edit together. Keep it safe."

"Thank you, Teacher."

He accepted it, overwhelmed by the favor.

Porygon2 had always been finding similar video materials for him to watch, but most were not as good as Adam's version edited specifically for training offense-as-defense.

"Video footage ultimately cannot compare to the depth of real practice. This is one of the reasons I became a Gym Leader."

Adam crossed his arms and reminded him, "But don't be too impatient. For a Trainer, seeing more Pokémon and battling them is a long, necessary path… Hmm?"

He suddenly turned his head.

Baimu followed his gaze and immediately spotted two sneaky little heads squeezing together at the doorway—who else but Miss Liuqi and her Altaria?

Their eyes meeting, Miss Liuqi gave an embarrassed hehe laugh.

"Grand-Uncle-Master! Baimu! Good morning!"

A voice as clear as an oriole from a valley rang in their ears. Having said that, she and Altaria vanished, clearly feeling she had interrupted the lesson and hurrying off.

Adam laughed ruefully. He had originally planned to call her over to help with the teaching, but considering the Mi Ke Li Cup was only two days away, Miss Liuqi needed to adjust her condition at the right time, and making her a sparring partner would affect her.

—The same went for Baimu.

So he said, "You and Biteful and the others need to be in good shape for the Mi Ke Li Cup, so for these two days I won't drill you and your Pokémon too hard.

"Considering the Mi Ke Li Cup's environment, let's start targeted training based on Water-type Pokémon moves."

Influenced by the organizer Mi Ke Li, the Mi Ke Li Cup had an unwritten custom—most Coordinator Trainers would use Water-type Pokémon in the competition.

In reality, using Pokémon of other types wouldn't interfere with the final score, but when everyone did it, the herd mentality affected every individual.

Homogenization was undoubtedly a good thing for Baimu.

"Yes!"

He nodded in agreement and began, under Adam's guidance, the boring and lengthy yet necessary accumulation process of practicing moves against each other.

—

Afternoon.

After a period of midday rest.

The old butler Sebastian led Baimu into a massive glass greenhouse.

Without a doubt, this was the place where Adam and Mi Ke Li's Pokémon lived day to day, similar to the area behind Professor Oak's house.

His gaze swept over Water-type Pokémon that each looked strong or weak, staring at him as if he were a giant panda, and he thought there really were a lot of species, almost covering Generations One through Eight.

But why did it seem like there weren't any from Paldea…

Hmm? Wait!

What's that? A Bouffalant?!

Baimu stared in astonishment at the mud-covered black bull not far away, his mind full of bewilderment at why a Bouffalant would be here.

Then he recalled that Bouffalant in the Paldea region had a special regional form—the Water Buffalo breed.

Due to its high fat content, it floated easily on water and could swim by spraying water from its two horns…

A water buffalo.

"Moo!"

As if it could hear his thoughts, the Paldean Bouffalant let out a loud bellow.

"Ohohoho, full of energy today as well," the old butler said with a smile, greeting it, clearly having been involved in the Pokémon care on a regular basis.

Passing through the dense rainforest.

A vast pool connected to the river outside appeared before Baimu.

He quickly spotted Adam on the bank of the pool, which seemed to connect to the inner sea of Lilycove City, along with the energetic Miss Liuqi.

"Baimu!"

Miss Liuqi, who had also seen him, waved cheerfully. Beside her, Altaria paced back and forth like a mother hen, raising its head to give a responding soft cry.

"Churu~~"

What an enviable beautiful voice.

Baimu had inherited some musical appreciation ability from the musician, otherwise he wouldn't have entertained the wild idea of having Blissey perform singing acts.

For a Pokémon naturally suited to singing like Murkrow, a Chansey that works hard later in life really can't catch up.

"Good afternoon, Teacher… Liu Liu Qiya."

He greeted her, saw Miss Liuqi's eyes suddenly go wide and then relax, followed by another wide-eyed look, and the corner of his mouth twitched.

The two had a teacher-student relationship where they joked with each other, which was why the girl had just now thought he was calling her and nearly had her head scared off, but once she realized, she inevitably felt a little indignant.

All Baimu calls Adam Teacher, so doesn't that make them different generations!

We each call each other by our own terms?

I call you Martial Uncle, you call me Teacher?

Good lad! You've got nerve!

In a place where others couldn't see, Miss Liuqi made a face at All Baimu; if it weren't improper to play on her phone in public, their chat interface would probably already have been flooded with all sorts of meme stickers.

"Good afternoon."

Adam nodded, and with a wave of his right hand, summoned his Milotic from the water.

"Milo~"

Milotic suddenly crawled ashore, shaking its wet tail fin and flopping onto a blue air mattress that had been prepared nearby.

He said softly: "This afternoon I'm preparing to teach you massage techniques exclusive to Milotic, as well as methods for maintaining its scales, fin pieces, and down."

Training a Pokémon clearly shouldn't be limited to combat; for a Coordinator, ensuring a Pokémon has a perfect outward appearance is equally important.

Miss Liuqi had come to help out; she had no outside engagements to attend today and was bored out of her mind.

All Baimu copied the example and released his Shiny Milotic, having it lie on the blue air mattress in the same long, upright posture as Adam's Milotic.

"Milo~"

The Shiny Milotic called out lazily.

Adam glanced at it, half-squatted beside it, and beckoned to All Baimu. "Come, come look."

He pointed at the base of the Shiny Milotic's tail and three inches above it. "The structure of a Milotic's tail fin is more dexterous than you'd imagine, but without proper kneading, it's very difficult to achieve the two methods of spreading and rotating."

Spreading, rotating.

It was the change that occurred when Adam's Milotic used Whirlpool and Dragon Tail, transforming its tail fin into a propeller-like structure.

All Baimu had always been curious how it was done, and hearing him explain it now, it seemed to have something to do with massage techniques?

He saw Adam press three fingers together at the two spots he had just pointed out and knead them firmly in a rotating motion several times.

Crack—a crisp sound.

The Shiny Milotic's expression froze, then it turned its head in disbelief, looking at its tail fin that had bloomed like a flower from a combined fan shape into a cross shape, and gave it two gentle shakes in amazement.

All Baimu was equally amazed. "That's amazing!"

He'd never before thought that massage could be used to develop a Pokémon's body.

"Does it look very simple? But you should know that without human maintenance, this kind of change easily worsens the burden on Milotic's tail fin joints, and when that happens it might even cause the tail fin to fall off."

Adam spoke at length and warned emphatically: "Once a tail fin falls off, growing it back is difficult; Milotic generally only have four tail fins in their entire lifetime."

"Understood."

He nodded, then watched as the cross-shaped tail fin changed back to its original fan-leaf form.

"The change takes time to adapt. Until it can perform the change on its own without relying on massaging the acupoints, don't casually try rotating it; that puts a burden on the muscles of its tail."

Adam added a few more key points, even gesturing emphatically with his hands, and had All Baimu try it himself to get a feel for the pressure.

He skillfully pressed and kneaded the Shiny Milotic's tail, his heart full of joy.

That's right, this was exactly what he wanted.

He recalled that Brock had also once personally taught him how to train Pokémon like this; this precious knowledge wasn't that it wasn't available online, but that it would get mixed in with false, unreliable information.

"A little higher up, this area plus this one—these two spots are the common weak points on a Milotic's body. During battle you must make sure they aren't attacked."

Adam pointed out the reason the Shiny Milotic had just been bound tightly and unable to move.

"Two spots…"

All Baimu blinked. He only knew one spot—the section of the Shiny Milotic that looked the fattest, where the thickened fat existed for the purpose of protecting the fragile internal organs.

"This area is where its nervous system is densely packed; once it takes a heavy hit there, it easily loses the ability to resist for a short time." Adam explained why the other spot was also a weakness.

Steelix's weakness is its joints, and the Shiny Milotic's weakness is its internal organs and nerves…

Long snake-type Pokémon are really complicated.

In the time that followed, Adam used his Milotic as a sample to teach All Baimu massage techniques exclusive to this type of Pokémon.

From the horn at the very top all the way to the tail, he didn't even let slip those two long whisker-like eyebrows.

"The eyebrows are important organs they use to sense the direction of water currents underwater. See those three black dots? They're actually open, generally used to filter murky water; remember to clean them, otherwise there'll be an odor."

Adam didn't let slip even the three "black dots" on Milotic's neck.

His understanding of this Pokémon was truly thorough from head to tail; he even had special maintenance oil prepared for the tail fin, which left All Baimu full of admiration.

Interestingly, during this period the Shiny Milotic learned a new move—

【Hydro Pump】.

The trigger was that when All Baimu kneaded the water-storage sac at the front of its abdomen, the intense urge to spray forced it to release all the water mixed with attribute energy in the organ in one go.

As is well known, Water-type moves require the water within the Pokémon's body as a medium to be used successfully.

Therefore, just as Electric-type Pokémon have a charge sac and Fire-type Pokémon have a fire-storage organ, Water-type Pokémon similarly have a comparable structure.

And being able to learn a high-power move of its own type naturally made All Baimu happy.

He only hoped it wouldn't be like that infamous streamer's traitor Lapras, where four Hydro Pumps in a row missed and nearly drained the PP dry.

——

The two days that followed.

All Baimu remained immersed in training his Milotic and in studying the concept of using offense in place of defense.

Adam had never taught him how to perform, on the grounds that everyone's aesthetic sense differed; at most he could describe his own impressions of performance from his own perspective, which did not mean the judges he faced would share his tastes.

"Performance has no fixed formula. It requires enough imagination and creativity, and an aesthetic that satisfies the public. In this respect, I really can't teach you too much."

In fact.

This was Adam being excessively modest.

Although the outside world claimed that as a top-tier Coordinator he had already retired, in Lilycove City his 【Water Art】 performances were a frequent occurrence, deeply loved by ladies and young ladies of every generation.

Every show was packed to capacity, with an endless stream of spectators.

In the Hoenn region, he was unquestionably one of the most famous Coordinators.

Some say that Mi Ke Li's growth to where he is today is deeply connected to the enthusiastic promotion by those ladies who once idolized his master.

All Baimu had to admit that the performance he designed for Milotic was modeled on Adam's Water Art shows, and performing it in front of the original always carried the awkwardness of a counterfeit meeting the genuine article.

Adam didn't find it annoying; on the contrary, he was quite pleased — though that pleasure was often tinged with a faint melancholy.

It left him quite puzzled.

Was there some little story behind the Water Art performances? Something like a routine designed for a certain person who had unfortunately passed away young.

Teacher Adam was still single to this day; perhaps there really was some unknown past…

Well then.

Such irresponsible speculation was too impolite.

All Baimu secretly admonished himself.

How could Adam have known that his bargain-basement student had been spinning tales about him behind his back? He had merely let out the sigh of a gacha player whose ship had sunk.

The contact and observation over these past two days had been just like the flood of reviews a big-data algorithm shoves at you, painting "All Baimu" as a must-pull god-tier, meta-defining card, persecuting him at every turn.

Of course.

As a true gentleman, Adam also understood the principle that what is destined to be yours will come, and what is not should not be forced; so he did not stay downhearted for long.

Are ordinary students not students?

With his mindset adjusted, Adam taught even more earnestly. He loved this feeling of passing on knowledge and experience, especially to someone he appreciated.

This sense of spiritual fulfillment had become one of the major reasons he had never bothered to compete for a spot among the Elite Four many years ago; in his view, becoming an Elite Four would likely make it hard to encounter so many trainers of every shape and kind.

After all, the Champion League only served tournament winners.

And so.

On the opening day of the Wallace Cup.

Adam offered his blessings to the departing All Baimu and Miss Liuqi. "I wish you a victorious start. This competition will surely become one of the precious experiences of your lives."

"Yes, Teacher."

"Grand-Uncle-Master, I will definitely take first place!"

The two of them answered in different voices.